The Child He Always Wanted
by Steadfast-Bright-Star
Summary: 'I look down into his eyes, waiting for that elusive flicker of love, for that moment when we finally connect.' Lukas holds his and Mathias's son for the first time and feels nothing. Later, alone in the dark, he wonders if he will ever match the love Mathias has for Emil or if he will always be second-best. Tie-in to 'Our Beloved Son' but can be read alone. AU, Dennor, Anko Family


Emil, the piece of paper tells me, is two weeks old. He was given up for adoption by his sixteen-year-old mother, although she chose his name and would like for us to keep it. Length 45cm, weight nine pounds, a healthy size for a baby his age. That is all there is to say about him. He is an empty vessel, without thoughts or a voice to articulate his thoughts, without interests or personality. Those are for us to form, and we will influence him as we can influence no one else. It's a terrifying responsibility, and one I never wanted or asked for.

We're waiting for him to be brought through now, and I feel nothing but dread. In just a few minutes, our young married couple's freedom will be over and we will be shackled to this child for the next eighteen years. The thin slice of time is narrowing like a crescent moon, and I find my thoughts hopelessly unresolved. Mathias can't sit still with all his nervous excitement. He keeps shifting position, glancing around the room, folding and unfolding his arms. I know what he's thinking. Everything has been leading up to this moment – all the forms, all the visits and searching questions, the hopes and waiting lists and near misses. I know how much he wants it and how much he deserves it and how much he'll love Emil. But I don't want it, even though I pretend I do for his sake and now, with just minutes until our baby is brought through to us, I wonder something I'm ashamed to even think of. I wonder if our marriage would have survived if I had refused to adopt a child.

"Are you ready?" Mathias asks me, breaking the thought-crowded silence. His voice is weak with nerves.

"Mostly." I reply, sick at the taste of the lie and hating the feeling that I have to hide things from him. I have never been quite sure of myself. Seeing him so in love with the idea of this baby, with something that isn't me, makes me pathetically insecure. I didn't want a child at first. Not that I don't like them particularly, I just never felt the appeal. But Mathias was so desperate that I couldn't refuse him for long. An image floats into my mind of the room we've decorated for Emil. Mathias planned it all out right at the start of this tortuous process, and we've had it prepared for a long time. The walls are powder blue – we always requested a boy – with darker blue stars stencilled on. He found the cot at a vintage shop, white wood with sprigs of blue flowers painted at each end. The curtains are blue and white checked and the window looks out over the garden. It's the kind of room designed by perfect, smiling families with plenty of money. Mathias is right to be proud of it. It's what it'll be used for, who it'll belong to, that concerns me. I swallow and lean forwards slightly, my body tense.

Mathias checks the time on his phone.

"Any minute now." he says.

"Exciting." I mumble neutrally. Like a child, I feel that if I close my eyes, make a wish and open them again, everything will be back the way I liked it, when we were just married and children weren't even an issue for consideration. I've never been so scared of anything. I don't know anyone who would make a better father than Mathias, and I don't know anyone who would make a worse one than me.

Mathias touches my arm lightly and I feel his apprehensiveness in the tremulous contact.

"We'll do fine, won't we?" he asks like a worried child.

"Of course," I reply insincerely. "We'd never have got through all these checks otherwise."

He removes his hand and rests his cheek against it. "I just hope you're right," he says, seemingly ashamed to be giving voice to his doubts. "We can't get this wrong. He's just a little baby. If he ends up in prison or something, that'll be our fault. won't it?"

His question is still hanging unanswered in the air when the door opens. We both sit up a little straighter and I hear Mathias breathe in sharply. The social worker we've been dealing with all these months, who's come to our house so many times, who's made us complete so many forms and wait for so long… Is here. And in her arms is a small, white-wrapped bundle. Emil. The Emil-bundle stirs and lets out a tiny whimper, a mere hint of what his full-scale crying will be like, and I feel a strange sensation running through me, an electrical current of terror and mute frustration. This is it. The moment has come. Emil is here and it's too late to do anything. I can't run away. I can't outline my worries or objections in a reasonable manner like all those advice websites told me to. There's nothing to do but accept the baby who fulfils all of Mathias's dreams but none of mine.

"He's just waking up," the social worker whispers to us, angling her precious bundle so that we can see a scrunched-up face, a fist sleepily uncurling like a desert flower. Mathias is overcome by sudden love for this baby, for our son, who has in this moment ceased to be an idea and become something real, the reward for our struggle. I don't feel anything. I wait for some sudden flow of profound feelings, for some sense of the world shifting, and when these things fail to appear, I try and fail to summon them up myself.

"You signed off the last thing this morning, didn't you?" she asks us, breaking our respective trances.

"Yes, we've done everything," Mathias replies, that nervous, excited tremor back in his voice. His eyes haven't left Emil.

The social worker smiles broadly. "Well," she says, "If everything's in order then I suppose… That's it then," She leans down and places Emil in Mathias's arms, then smiles and steps back. "Your parenting journey starts here." she says conclusively. I imagine a key turning in a lock.

"Thank you so much." Mathias replies, awestruck, staring down at our son who is just beginning to blink slowly and move around, confused by the unfamiliar embrace. With one last smile, the social worker turns and leaves the room. Emil is ours now. He's our responsibility.

Once we're alone, I feel a shroud settle on my shoulders. We have gone past the point of no return. Emil is ours now. We are legally his parents, and everything a parent does, we – I – will be expected to do. I try to collect myself. then turn and look at Mathias. He's in raptures over Emil, and even though he's a man and even though the light is bleakly yellow instead of a holy candle glow, the scene reminds me in some strange way of one of those Virgin and Child paintings.

"Hello baby. Hello little Emil," he says softly, reaching into the bundle and letting Emil grab his finger with his whole hand. He leans in closer, like he's telling a secret. "We waited a long, long time for you, little Emil," he says lovingly. "Sometimes we thought we wouldn't even get you at all. But you're here now. We're a family now."

Mathias turns to look at me and his eyes are gleaming with tears of pure joy.

"I always dreamed it would be like this," he says. "I always knew our little boy would be the most perfect one in the world.

"He is." I somehow manage to reply. He strokes Emil's cheek with his thumb, smiling at his soft, contented baby noises. I feel remote, as though the scene is happening in my mind, or in someone else's life. It can't be real. How can it be real? It was only this morning that we found out Emil was available, that he was for us. There wasn't enough time to prepare. Yes, we had everything bought in advance. There's the car seat, the pram, the clothes, the bottles and enough formula milk to last him until he's about thirty… But I just didn't have enough time for it all to sink in, to realise that I have to be a father to this boy, that I have to love him. I don't know how to be a parent and now that I finally and unwillingly am one, it's too late to ask anyone, to admit my inability to raise a child. Even when I was a child myself, I had no idea how to interact with other children.

"Lukas," Mathias says, breaking my train of thought before it descends too far into misery. "Lulu, you have a go holding him now."

"Ok." I reply dubiously, wondering if my lingering reservations are showing on the face I always try so hard to keep impassive. He leans over and, with infinite care, hands Emil over to me. The weight comes as a shock – that and the warmth and the fact that he is so fully, indisputably _alive_. His eyes are open now and I see that they're the most extraordinary shade of purple, the pale shell-like colour of the inside of a violet petal. I look down into them, waiting for that elusive flicker of love, for that moment when we finally connect. I will myself to feel something, to force the love to bud and bloom.

"Hello, Emil," I say awkwardly, unsure how to talk to him. "Welcome to our family." I continue uncertainly, aware that my voice holds no tenderness. Emil's face begins to scrunch up. There's a small, hiccupping sob, then silence as he draws a breath, then the crying begins, a piercing noise that vibrates all through me. I look helplessly at Mathias and he takes Emil back from me, shushing him gently until the noise dwindles to a few whimpers, then nothing. He has such a gift for this sort of thing. I don't know what it is with me. Can Emil somehow sense my lack of enthusiasm?

"Don't worry, sweetheart. He's probably just tired," Mathias reassured me. "Babies get stressed out easily and he's been moved around a lot today."

I sigh and look down at the now-contented Emil. "Yes," I reply. "Yes, that's probably it.

…..2am, One week later…..

The feeling of not being needed I had when I first held Emil hasn't gone away, only intensified with every time that only Mathias can soothe him, every time that only Mathias can get him to stay still long enough to be dressed or to finish his bottle. As I lie awake listening for the sounds of Mathias feeding Emil in the next room, I feel my heart beginning to break. It's true that raising a baby wasn't at the top of my list of dreams but I do want to be the best possible father to him now he's here. I shift position, too aware of all my limbs to be comfortable, then kick the covers off. It's no use. I just can't get to sleep.

I slip out of bed, navigating the darkness by the shaft of love-gold light shining from under the door. I feel weightless, insubstantial, as I turn the handle and go out onto the landing, drawn Mathias's soft voice murmuring to Emil. It reminds me of being a child again, of crouching at the top of the stairs and listening to my parents' conversations, trying to make some sense of the murky torrent of words. I stop by the open door and peer in, feeling a stab of sadness tinged with envy at the scene.

Mathias is giving Emil his bottle, talking to him as he does.

"Come on, baby Emil," he says. "That's it. You've got to drink up all your lovely delicious milk or you'll never be daddy's little brain surgeon." He's standing by the window and again I am reminded of a painting, far more strongly than before. Against the blackness outside, they seem to glow, suffused with the softness of the lamplight. There is a beauty in the scene, a serenity, a perfection. It is a kind of beauty I have never before been able to appreciate. It goes beyond the aesthetic into things I do not even understand, things I worry will be a mystery to me. I look at Mathias's face, and the love I see in his expression amazes me. It is the true love of a parent for a child, the love that gives and gives and asks nothing in return, the love that is deathless and cannot be diminished by death. I know these things have been said a thousand times before but here, now, I am discovering them for myself. I watch him, watch the infinite care and gentleness in all his motions. The bottle is empty and he's cradling Emil to his chest, rocking him gently to get him back to sleep. I watch him and I know that he will never ask for anything else, that Emil is all he ever wanted. I watch as he kisses the top of Emil's pale blond head and I know that he will never lose his temper with him, that no matter what happens he will always love him as much as he does at this moment. Whether I can equal that love is something I am afraid to even consider. I turn and go back to bed, fleeing into the dark like a criminal.

….. 4am, The same night…..

It's my turn to feed Emil and, unconsciously mimicking Mathias, I too stand by the window. Emil is a numbing weight in my arms, his constant swallowing motions as he drinks the milk like a second heartbeat, a constant rhythm. I stare out at the view. It's winter, and the darkness is as impenetrable as it has been for hours, without even the first hint of dawn. The mountains that encircle our town are just visible, a denser blackness against the sky, and the fjord lies like a pane of smoked glass, the house rising up above it. Here and there, I see a few scattered lights and wonder what people are doing at this hour. The silence gapes, and I have a sense of needing to fill it. I look down at Emil, at his serious face as he methodically empties the bottle.

"Come on, Emil," I prompt, trying not to sound too impatient. "You need to finish it all so that you can be strong and healthy." I sound ridiculous, like I'm reading the script of a children's TV programme. I look outside again, feeling isolated in the dark. The lamp by the window shines a tight square onto the garden, the grass that Mathias is already imagining adorned with goalposts, a trampoline, a climbing frame, Emil's own vegetable patch in among the flowers. I feel strangely absent from this life he's planned out, completely surplus to requirements. My presence is superfluous, and I add nothing by being here. The bottle is empty. I put Emil down in the cot and watch for a few minutes until I can be sure he's fully asleep.

I crawl back into bed, relieved at its warmth in the coldness of the night and my thoughts. Mathias, half-awake, slips an arm around me.

"Did he go down alright?" he whispers.

"Fine." I reply, not wanting to say anything to anyone.

"Another two hours then," he says. "Sleep well. I love you."

"You too." I murmur. I shut my eyes and the whittled peaks of the mountains rise in my vision. They close around me and I am alone.


End file.
